


better farther on

by sleeplessandcynical



Category: Professional Wrestling, World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: Alternate Universe - Small Town, Bullying, Drug Use, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friendship/Love, Gratuitous chickens, Grief/Mourning, I Don't Even Know, I will never apologize for Luke, I've been futzing with this forever, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Mutual Pining, Other, Parent Death, Randy is a douchebag, Suicide Attempt, Teen Angst, Underage Drinking, Unsent letters, author is a salty hillbilly, original AFAB non-binary character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-10
Updated: 2017-08-10
Packaged: 2018-12-03 19:41:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11539119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleeplessandcynical/pseuds/sleeplessandcynical
Summary: Luke Harper is just a big, quiet Army vet living on the family farm in his backcountry hometown. He still thinks about his best friend from school, sometimes, but they've long since moved away and there's no way he'll ever see them again. Probably.Larry Sparks - What Kind of Man - "Better Farther On"(*see endnotes for further information)A special thank you tonever-shuts-upfor pointing out, after hearing me sing this song to a friend at a birthday party (a tradition for the past several years), that it would work really well with this half-finished fic I had bumbling around in my notes.(there's a lot of potential warnings in this one. details in notes.)





	better farther on

**Author's Note:**

> this story contains and/or mentions:  
> -queer-bashing and homophobic/transphobic language  
> -underage drinking and drug use (pot smoking)  
> -bullying  
> -self-injury and suicide attempt(s)  
> -parental death  
> -some violence (mostly of the pushing and shoving variety)  
> -drunk driving (or at least trying to)  
> -the author oversharing about their own trauma, as per usual 
> 
> (the cynic in me just wants to call it "typical small-town shit," but that's not particularly helpful. I don't think any of this is super-graphic, but I'd much rather err on the side of caution when it comes to warnings.)

_farther on, still go farther_  
_count the milestones one by one_  
_my love will forsake you never_  
_it is better farther on_

 

Luke saw them for the first time in the spring of fifth grade. They weren't "them" then, though. Well, they _were,_ in the same way that they were shy and careful and anxious and kind, but they were called something else. They were reading quietly in the back of his class, ignoring everything that was going on, and the teacher said they'd already finished the curriculum for the year and had been allowed to duck ahead. That was how Luke found out they were two full grades younger, the same age as his little brother.  

The book in their hands was eighth-grade algebra. The book on their desk was by some guy named Thoreau. Luke wasn't entirely sure he could even  _spell_ Thoreau. 

It took him five weeks to work up the nerve to tell them “hi.” (He counted.) And that was literally all he could bring himself to actually  _say_. They turned bright red and stammered something back before actually covering their face with a book as though that would make them disappear. He tried it again the week after, and that time they managed to say “hi” back.

The next year, they'd been bumped up to sixth grade with him, and he saw them a lot more. They still didn't talk much, but that was okay. Neither did he. Most kids their age talked too much, and most of it was mean.

Nearly every day, they would go walking or running with one of their dogs. Sometimes with their dad, and often very early in the morning when Luke was out feeding the animals – mostly chickens, but the occasional boarded horse, depending on how everything else was going - or fixing things. That's how he found out they were neighbors. That's how he found out it was just them and their dad. Luke was a little envious; he had to share the farmhouse with his parents and two brothers. He would always wave at them as they passed, and after a few weeks, they started to shyly wave back. Eventually, they graduated to greeting each other, and sometimes even  _talking._

One time in the eighth grade, they were out by themselves. Everything was beautiful. The sun was shining, summer was poking its head around the corner, they were smiling hard, and Luke even made them  _laugh_  by pointing out that their Social Studies teacher, a rather round little man with an extremely serious gaze, looked  _exactly_  like the angry groundhog they’d chased off the street the day before. But then of course, of  _course_  his little brother chose that same moment to come out into the front yard. Their smile died in their throat, and they stared at him with big owl eyes before taking their dog and quietly slipping away through the grass, chewing on the threadbare cuff of their flannel shirt.

“You’re friends with  _that_ loser?” Randy sneered, spitting on the ground.   

“Why wouldn’t I? That’s our neighbor, after all. Mom always says to be nice to the neighbors.” Luke hated how much that sounded like a cop-out.

“I don’t think it counts if the neighbors  _suck_. She’s only in your class because she couldn’t handle being in mine.”

He’d always been a brat, but once he turned double digits, it was like he’d ratcheted himself up to a whole ‘nother level. Luke wanted to slap the shit out of him more often than not.

“Can’t take a joke or nothin’. All we did was dump Coke in her bookbag and she snitched. Well, and that thing with the stink bugs.” The kid almost sounded proud of himself.

Luke wasn’t exactly sure why he felt this way, some strange bubbling-up in his chest, but suddenly he was sorely tempted to pick up his little brother and dump him face-first in a pile of chicken shit. “Leave her  _alone._ At least she’s nice.”

The next time they talked at school, Luke slipped up out of frustration and said he  _wished_  it was just him, and they got even quieter than usual and moved their desk away.

It made Luke feel queasy, so he asked his older brother what he should do. He didn’t know much about this stuff; divorces, which is what he assumed it must have been, weren’t very common around here.

“You didn’t know, little man?” Bray drawled. He was seventeen then, reading a lot of philosophy textbooks, wearing ugly shirts, and chain-smoking unfiltered Camels out his bedroom window after their parents went to bed. “There’s no mom because there’s no  _mom._  She ain’t of this particular worldly iteration anymore, man. She’s been freed of her chains and moved  _on_  to better things.” 

Luke told him to cut the bullshit; turned out it was cancer, the year before they and their dad moved to town.

The two older boys didn’t know the youngest was listening.

The next day, Randy accosted them in the hallway right after the final bell of the day, hissing insults. “I hate you. Everyone hates you. You think you’re special, but you’re just a  _pussy._  Why don't you just die like your mom did?" Randy answered the venom in his own question by shoving them into a corner. When they just looked down and didn’t respond, he said it louder, and pushed them again.

Luke heard the ruckus and came running, muddy boots thudding on the shiny tile. He tried to put his body between the two, but they ducked under his outstretched arm and slugged his brother in the face. He promptly fell over and Luke stood between them again, glaring down at the gangly boy on the ground. Randy tried to get up, but Luke instinctively gave him a shove that sent him skittering backward on his ass again, shocking himself with the snarl that emerged when he opened his mouth to say, “ _Back off_.”

“You’re supposed to help me,” Randy whined. “You’re my  _brother.”_

“Yeah,” Luke said, slowly, chewing his words over. “But you’re a jerk.”

He grabbed them by the forearm and they flinched, hard, and before he could pull back, they hung onto his hand. But to Luke’s surprise, they didn’t shove it away, just moved it to the crook of their elbow. He all but dragged them down the hall and into the back room of the auditorium; he knew there was some empty space there from where he’d helped build sets for the spring musical. It was where he went sometimes to think. He didn’t stop moving until they were tucked away in a back corner, and when he finally turned around, he realized they were crying. And tugging on that same flannel shirt. It was May. He wasn’t sure what all these things together meant, but it couldn’t have been good.

Luke didn’t realize he’d been apologizing, over and over, until they told him to stop. Their eyes were glazed and a thousand miles away, and they’d wrapped their arms around themselves as though to ward off a chill that wasn’t there. The only thing he could think to do was embrace them himself; they stiffened at first, but before he could untangle his long arms, they breathed out and rested their head on his chest. He didn’t say anything else, just kept hugging them for as long as he could.

 

 

 _as we travel through this desert_  
_storms beset us by the way_  
_but beyond the river jordan_  
_lies a field of endless day_

* * *

High school came and was surprisingly peaceful, at least for the first two years.

Luke saw them grow. Not up, not very far at least. Certainly not as much as he did; they topped out right at his shoulder when he made his own transformation into what felt like a tree trunk that happened to have limbs. He sat behind them in class sometimes and they'd turn around and glare at him when he accidentally bumped his big boots on their desk, but it always ended with their smile. 

Luke loved that smile. They didn't use it much. They didn't get the chance. Small towns are fucking murder on people who don't fit in and aren't old or rich enough to be called "eccentric." 

In eleventh grade, Randy happened, and they smiled even less. He’d shot up like a weed surprisingly young, and his size and strength landed him on the varsity football team, which was an unusual if not unheard-of feat for a freshman. He loved the attention he got from parents, other kids, and especially the girls. It didn’t make him any less of a dick, that’s for sure. More than once, Luke had to pull the person he'd come to think of as his best friend out of a sea of letterman’s jackets as they swung haymakers and spat fury. Sometimes there was blood. Sometimes it definitely wasn't theirs. 

In the fall of that year, they asked him to the homecoming dance, and he said yes, and they both seemed surprised. They wore a dress from the Goodwill, and motorcycle boots. Luke had to borrow a suit; his big brother didn’t live at home anymore but they were almost the same size. Bray was a little too excited, pulling dress shirts out of his closet; he’d been working at the one bar in town and had cleaned up his act a little bit as a result, although he still refused to cut his hair.

The pants were a little too short, but since Luke only owned one pair of shoes anyway, he just polished his work boots within an inch of their lives and hoped it would make up the difference.  

When Randy showed up late, and drunk, and tried to get in his brother's face for dancing with "that  _thing_ ," the two sneaked away to climb onto the roof of their high school. They were thrilled to sit on the edge and watch the stars; Luke knew they loved tall things. Well, that and he’d brought a flask.  

The whiskey made them both chatty, relatively speaking, and when the wind got a little cold, he went to take off his jacket for them to wear but instead they just tucked themselves inside, underneath his arm, and laid their head across his chest. Hidden in there like a secret, they told him they didn't want to be like this anymore. That it hurt to be called the girl with no mom. That it hurt to be called a  _girl._ That they wished they could change everything about themselves and start over. That maybe then people would like them, because people wouldn’t know any better.  

Luke wanted to tell them he liked them either way. Every way. He didn't. He didn't know how.

Later that year, they disappeared from school. When Luke worked up the nerve to call their house after three days, their dad said they were in the hospital. He offered to take Luke for visiting hours, but he only went once - they looked sick and ashen and humiliated, woozy and bandaged. Their eyes were glazed over again, and they asked him not to come back. “I don’t want to be seen like this. Hurts enough on its own.”

He did what they asked, but in a fit of unhealed emotion, he also did something else: wrote it all down. Everything he couldn’t say went into one of those old black-and-white composition books. The first seven pages were full of sloppy notes from Algebra II, and after a few moments of thought, he kept them in there. Cover. Just in case.

_I miss you. You’re perfect. I'm so sorry. I'm so fucking sorry. I hope everything’s gonna be fine someday. Someday way the fuck away from here. It’s got to get better. It’s got to get better. Come home soon. Please._

_We need you. I need you._

_And if I said that, you’d never talk to me again._  

He just kept writing to them until they called and said they were home, and then surprised himself by not being able to stop. He never was one for his own words, but the thoughts poured themselves out and it felt better to let them go, so he did. He took to hiding the notebook in random places around his small bedroom, whether it was under the mattress, behind the dresser drawer, even inside of larger books. Randy was a nosy little fucker. 

Luke felt like a kid sneaking comics after lights-out, hiding under the sheets with a flashlight and a chewed-up ballpoint that had some feed-store logo printed on the side. 

 _It ain't right that I look at you and think about how pretty you are. Handsome? I don't even know what to call it. But I can't breathe when you're near me and that's so wrong when you can barely bring yourself to breathe at all. I'm so glad you're still here._  

Senior year, Luke asked them to the prom, and they said yes, and they both seemed surprised.

As the big day arrived, they seemed downright terrified. He brought them flowers from the beds in his front yard, and they tucked one behind their ear and the other into the front pocket of that borrowed suit coat. Despite the perfect spring weather, they'd been wearing long sleeves for months, and their simple shift dress was topped with a soft, loose cardigan. 

They drove, in their dad's big pickup, and by the time they finished sharing a joint behind the event hall, they were almost smiling and at the very least no longer looking quite so green behind the gills. It probably didn't hurt that there was no Randy this time; prom was for juniors and seniors only. When they walked inside, it seemed like no one noticed, and Luke heard them let out a huge breath that he guessed was relief. 

He wasn't so good at dancing, especially to slow jams. They weren't much better, and it quickly degenerated into three of his favorite things to do with them: laughing, hugging, and talking shit. When they stretched up to put their arms around his neck, the sleeve of their sweater fell down enough to reveal, out of the corner of his eye, a thick, reddish-silver scar that ran parallel down their forearm. Before he could stop himself or even figure out exactly why the urge had come on so strong, Luke turned his face and kissed it. 

They made a  _sound_ in the back of their throat that he couldn't identify, and he froze. They hauled him in tight and held him, not speaking, for a very long time. 

On their way home, they pulled over at the overlook next to the river. They got out, pulled a pair of baggy jeans and a flannel from the backseat, and went around the far side of the truck to change. Then they lit another joint. Luke joined them in silence. 

"You can't do that," they finally said, voice thick. 

"Did I hurt you?" he asked, worriedly. 

They shrugged, and took another drag. "Nah. But I'm a big ole fuckin' mess and you shouldn't."

 _Can't, or shouldn't?_ Luke thought. "You're going to  _college,_ " he said, with more than a little wonder. "You got a  _scholarship._  You’re the… smallest mess I know.”

That at least turned up the corner of their mouth.

They pulled the tailgate down and hopped into the truck bed. There was a sleeping bag back there. And a camp pad, which they folded and sat down on. Luke pulled out his flask, tossed his jacket into the backseat, and climbed up there with them. 

“Are you really joining the army?” they finally asked, shattering the silence of the night.

“Think so. It’s someplace to go, at least."

"You gotta be safe, okay? Promise me." It sounded like their throat hurt. "I don't know what I'll do if you die."

Luke's heart thudded so loud in his chest, he was half-convinced they could hear it. "Promise." 

They leaned in and pecked his cheek before blushing a color not typically found in nature. When they pulled back, he dropped his head onto their shoulder, and they hugged him without saying a word. They still had his flower behind their ear. 

After they dropped him off, many hours later, he pulled the composition book out from under his nightstand, and scrawled in it for what felt like weeks.

_I think I love you. I love you. What if I die without saying it? What if I fuck everything up? What if I already did? Why can’t I do anything to make it hurt less? No chance. No fucking chance. What am I gonna do without you? Why is everything so much slower when you’re here? Why does it make so much sense?_

When his chest finally stopped hurting enough to let him take a deep breath, it was sunrise. Luke crept quietly out the door with every intention of using his brother’s lighter to torch the notebook in the fire pit out back. But then he decided that it was a very good time, as good a time as any, to start drinking in earnest. Maybe it would hurt less. Maybe he'd wake up and have it all figured out. 

But drinking yourself to sleep over being in love with your best – hell, maybe  _only_ – friend sounds a hell of a lot more romantic on paper than it does in practice, even if puking your twisted-up teenage guts out at the base of a tree on the far side of the back forty gives you a great excuse to explain away your tears. Luke rinsed his mouth out with the hose, tried to brush the mud off his pants, and still managed to feed the chickens before stumbling back indoors. 

 

 

 _oh, my brother, are you weary_  
_of the roughness of the way?_  
_does your strength begin to fail you_  
_and your vigor to decay?_

* * *

He wrote them from boot camp, and they sent him postcards almost every week, signed with their new name. He wrote them back as much as he wrote his parents, maybe more, even though it felt boring and stupid and had too many words about mud.

Luke wanted to tell them he missed them. He didn't. He didn't know how.

He did his time in the army. Eight years, two tours overseas, a handful of different stations, and ended up back home, for a dearth of other options. It was okay. Randy was long gone, Bray had bought a little house on the far side of town, and plenty of people had work for him. He fixed houses and built porches and tended his garden and fed the animals. One day blurred into the next. 

He'd heard through their letters that they were teaching math at the big city university. Not that far away, but far enough and busy enough and important enough. Luke's parents had left him the farm and moved to Florida. They always asked if he'd seen them. He hadn’t; they didn't really come home and when they did, they didn't meander by, and it was hard to tell who was there because they still shared the truck with their dad. Luke sometimes helped him around the house, though; took the mail in when he was off visiting them in the city. 

Luke wanted to ask them to come see him. Or the other way around. Anything. But he didn't. He didn't know how.

He even went to the city once, just to see what it was like, but barely made it out of the train station before he panicked. It was too loud, all concrete and glass, and it made his teeth hurt. He kept the notebook in his toolbox now, on the passenger seat, and grabbed for it desperately the second he got back to the parking lot. 

_You stopped writing when I left base for the last time, which is my fault. I don't think you even know I'm still in this godforsaken town. I don't know how I would tell you; it's not exactly something I'm proud of. (I am, however, sure you'd be proud that I think I just used a semicolon right.) Plus, what am I going to do, just show up at your dad's house and hope you're there? You're better off without me. I'm clumsy in every sense. So much safer to love you from a distance. Safest, for you, not to love you at all. _

He almost moved on. He almost forgot about them, or at least accepted that they were gone. But  _almost_  is a big fucking space in the universe that covers a lot of ground.

And then, one day. One summer day. Worn out from trying to play polite host to his blockheaded little brother, he took the chance to go for a drive. A few miles from their alma mater, he spotted the roadside stand on his friend Erick's farm that had been there for three generations, and decided it would make a real good alibi. He was fumbling through the tomatoes when a familiar truck pulled up alongside his, and a smaller person clambered awkwardly out. They spent a few minutes checking out the sweet corn before looking up and dropping all their ears. 

"Luke? Is that you?" they asked, tilting their head, and he nodded slowly, not trusting his voice. It occurred to him faintly that he must look a mess, having gone the traditional "no more uniform" route of letting his hair and beard grow long and wild. What his dad had called “gone native,” although Luke wasn’t sure that was the right phrase. At least he'd tied his hair back for once. But even as he was trying to cough up an apology, they were smiling.  _Smiling!_ "I didn't recognize you with the beard at first! It suits you."

Luke realized he should probably say something. Anything. 

 _Holy fuck I missed you so much I don't know why you're back and I don't care -_  “Oh. Thanks.”

They smiled again, the gentlest thing. “Outspoken as ever.”

He managed to successfully set his tomatoes down before crushing them in his arms so hard they had to tap out. “Shit. Sorry.” He loosened the embrace, and he could have sworn they held on a couple seconds longer than they had to before stepping back and starting to pick the corn up off the ground. He tried to help, but they waved him off with a small smile. 

“How are you, man?” They glanced up at him from their crouch, looking like absolute well-dressed hell in razor-creased Dickies and a college v-neck, the flush threatening to chase their otherwise well-healed scars out of hiding. Circles under their eyes. Hair in their face. A little sheen of sweat in the summer heat.

_Come home soon. Please. We need you. I need you._

Luke realized he was staring. “Good. Just, ya know… tomatoes.” He scooped up his own produce off the stand. “The one damn thing I can never get to grow right.”

“I feel that. They’re a beast sometimes.” They snagged a few other items, walked to the small register together, and paid. The big redhead behind the cashbox smiled crookedly at them both, and shook both their hands in a bone-crushing grip before sending them on their way.

As they loaded their stuff into the truck, Luke finally cleared his throat. “I didn’t know you were in town.”

They looked up at him with those beat-up eyes again. “I didn’t tell anybody. Didn’t think to. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” He rushed ahead before he ran out of words. “You wanna have dinner tomorrow, if you're still here? Randy’s in town right now but he’s leaving in the morning.”

They nodded, and they both seemed surprised. “I’d like that a lot. I’m at… I’m at the house. Number’s the same.”

They hugged him again, and ducked their head into his collarbones in a way that made him shiver.

 _There you were. There you were. My heart hurts so bad. I don't know what happened, but I know that look on your face, I know it like I've seen in it my fuckin' nightmares because I have, and not just on you. Pain. Something in your chest is fit to be tied and you probably think you can't get loose. You're hurting and I know I can't fix it but fucked if I'm not gonna try._   

But first he had to deal with Randy, who of course wanted to go out to the one bar in town with his high-school football buddies. Bray had moved from bartender to manager to owner over the last few years, and all these small-town big fish figured they might be able to impress their way into some free beer courtesy of big brother. But Bray was a shrewd and sharp businessman, even if he talked a little funny sometimes, and he didn’t give much of anything away for free except rambling advice. Luke already knew it was a foolhardy mission before they walked through the door. Hell, the only reason he went at all was because he knew these prodigies wouldn’t settle on a DD and he wasn’t in the mood to get a call from the local black-and-whites at 3am to bail out his sibling’s poor judgment.  

And then of  _course_  there they were, there they were, nursing a dark beer and looking like they could think a hole into the bar top next to the stack of papers they were working on. As Bray wiped down fixtures and cleaned glasses, Luke could see him murmur the occasional word or two their way through his beard. They looked up and bit their lower lip before replying, tugging on the collar of their dress shirt and tie. He wanted to go to them, but he didn't know what to say, and he was deeply invested in keeping the dumber of his siblings well the fuck away from anyone that might get hurt. 

Randy and his pals had been knocking back shots in the crowded bar, making sure to go to different bartenders for different rounds in the hopes that no one would notice and cut them off, but they kept getting progressively noisier. By about the fifteenth repetition of their stupid football stories, Luke was ready to jam a fork in his own eye. Instead, he found a few of the locals at the nearby pool table, and wandered over there, still keeping an eye on the bar. They were scribbling notes in the margins of their papers, having switched to ginger ale after that first beer. 

After a couple rounds, Luke figured he should probably get close enough to wrangle Randy and his friends, but as he sat back down at their table he realized he had a real bastard of a headache coming on just from the volume of their voices. Still talking about high school.  _Best days of our lives_ and all that happy fuckin' horseshit. All the noise seemed to weave together into an overwhelming crash of sound, and suddenly he really,  _really_ didn't want to be there anymore.

Luke glanced over at them, and they caught his eye and glanced back, and then Randy grabbed his shoulder and slurred, far louder than could have ever possibly been necessary, “Why’re you looking at that fucking faggot? Who gives a shit?” He shoved back and stood up, knocking his chair over in the process. "Wait a sec. Is that... Is that the fucking ugly bitch with the dead mom? Is she a tranny now? What the fuck is  _she_  doing here? D'you finally fuck her? What was  _that_ like?"

The ruckus brought their other sibling out from behind the bar with a warning look on his face as the remaining customers stared. 

“Little brother, you need to get your ass out of my fine establishment,” Bray growled, clenching his fists. “You’re acting a sloppy mess and your  _language_  is beyond the pale. I will not have that nonsense befouling my reputation, blood or not.”

Luke nodded to his big brother, gave them what he hoped translated as an apologetic look, and then nonchalantly yanked his little brother out the front door by the collar of his shirt. The other two followed, looking confused as ever. Randy was sputtering objections and nonsensical profanity, but it wasn’t until they approached the car and Luke let him go long enough to try and get the keys that he actually fought back.

“You’re too drunk for this shit, little bro. I’m driving.”

“Not a fucking chance.” Before he had time to protest, Randy shoved Luke into the backseat with one of the loud idiot friends, and started to get in the front with the other loud idiot friend, neither of whom's names he could even remember.

“Jesus. Let me out of the fucking – did you put the  _child locks_ on?” Luke could feel his face turning red. He was pissed, angrier than he could ever remember being before.

Then he saw them leaving the bar and walking to their truck, and his stomach dropped like a stone. 

Randy saw them too, and slammed on the gas, circling the parking lot at breakneck speed. Just as they were heading for the exit, he cut the wheel, and nearly crashed into them.

"What the  _fuck_ are you doing?" Luke barely recognized his own voice, but it was too late. Brakes screamed, and Randy was out of the car like a stumbling shot. 

"Hey faggot! You think you can fucking hide from me? I'm gonna fucking kill you this time, cocksucker!"

He yanked on their door. It wouldn't open, so he bent down and yanked it again. In one smooth motion, they popped the lock and kicked the truck door directly into Randy's skull. He staggered backwards, and they got out, eyes blazing, back plastered against the truck. Randy took a wild swing and missed, but Idiot #1 had caught up and grabbed their arm, forcing them away from the truck and out into the open while Luke and Idiot #2 were still scrambling to get out of the backseat.   

Luke's heart was screaming and his brain seemed fogged by fear and anger. He came up behind Idiot #1 and, deciding that a fair fight was clearly not the issue, simply rabbit-punched him in the back of the head. Hard. He let go of them, and Luke shoved him onto the ground. Then he looked up, trying to figure out how to deal with Randy, just in time to see his stupid little brother be on the receiving end of a tooth-rattling punch from a much smaller fist. He staggered, and they grabbed the truck door and hit him with it again. Idiot #2 took a swing from behind and clipped the side of their head, but before anybody else could respond, Luke slammed a big arm around his neck and locked in a figure-four RNC. 

Old combatives habits die hard. So do idiots, and it was probably for the best; Luke didn’t really have any desire to go to jail that night. When Idiot #2 started coughing, Luke tossed him aside like the garbage he was, and stood nose-to-nose with the instigator. They were the exact same height, but football was long over and Luke had twenty-five pounds of muscle on his little brother. After a few very tense seconds, Randy blinked and looked away. 

Just then, Bray thundered out of the bar, lecturing furiously, and pulled the keys out of the ignition. "You pugnacious idiots honestly believe I'm going to let your drunk ass drive home? Fear may be a foolish human construct, but get yourselves in  _line_ before I call the cops instead of calling in a favor." His eyes were blazing as he stared them all down, methodically, one by one. When his eyes dipped to meet theirs, it was like the fire went out, and he damn near smiled. "My dear, if you'd be so inclined as to give at least a particular one of these highbrow intellectuals a ride, I'd be much obliged. Assuming you're finished rearranging their faces and all." 

They glanced away, and Luke realized they were  _all_  looking around like kids caught with the cookie jar. Sheepish. 

"Yessir," they said. "I'll take the tall one."

Bray chuckled at the joke. "Please ensure Brother Luke gets home safe. Eventually."

They blushed to the roots of their hair. "Yessir." Then they turned to Luke. "You coming?"

"Couldn't keep me away," he muttered, not intending for it to come out quite like...  _that._

"Luke, if you don't reconsider how you present yourself to the world, you might give our lovely friend here more than they bargained for. Possibly in the form of some sort of cardiac event." 

Their face was threatening to turn purple.

"I love you, big brother, but you need to knock that shit off." Luke hopped up into the truck and grabbed the door handle. "See you this weekend." 

Bray only smiled inscrutably as the door thudded shut and he turned to address the other three. "Now that the honeymooners are taken care of, y'all are shit outta luck. Your asses are planted on this sidewalk until your ride gets out here, and if you so much as shift your weight, I  _will_  involve the police. You think I won't do it because you're kin, but you've used up your good graces with me to the tenth power. I will dime you out quicker'n a heartbeat."

"The fuck do you even care?" Randy mumbled, and Bray swatted him upside the back of his head. 

"It's called  _compassion_ , you skinless lizard. And you'd better start pooling now, because Erick deserves far more than gas money for what he's agreed to put up with."

 

 

 _farther on, well, how much farther?_  
_count the milestones one by one_  
_no more doubting, only trusting_  
_it is better farther on_  

* * *

White-knuckling the steering wheel, they pulled the truck up to the shoulder that overlooked the river, stripped their top half down to their v-neck undershirt, and threw a couple of thick blankets in the truck bed. They clambered up and laid back, and he joined them, feeling the bed shift under his weight. The stars were out, clear and bright. 

It was like nothing had changed. It was like everything had changed. 

"Why did you even come back to this shithole?" Luke finally asked. 

They laid there for a long time and didn't say anything. "Dad's gone. Heart attack. Well, a bunch of them. He thought it might be coming but it all happened real fast. They gave me a few weeks to deal with the house and everything else. I missed it here, though. Missed the quiet." They laughed bitterly.  

Luke glanced over at them from the corner of his eye. Their gaze was unfocused, on a point someplace far away. "I'm so sorry. Let me know if there's anything I can do."

"Be careful, I might take you up on that. Besides, Dad said you helped him a lot with the land and the house once I was gone. He was really grateful.   _I'm_ really grateful." Their voice grew heavy, and they rubbed their eyes. 

Luke instinctively reached out his hand, and they rolled over and took it, and all he could think about was how small they looked next to him. And how damned handsome. Definitely handsome. He'd seen a picture of them in the newspaper when they got promoted to professor, the youngest in the school's history, and he'd kept it on his fridge for a while, in awe of how the changes to their body made them look so much more... Comfortable? Happy? 

Now, though, they were curled up on themselves, on their side like they were fit to puke. "I'm sorry I never called or anything once you got out," they said, voice barely a whisper. "There was a lot going on and I figured you were probably better off."

"Hey now, thinking like that is  _my_  job," he murmured, and they raised an eyebrow. He continued, "I'm the one who dragged ass back to this bullshit town. You made it." 

"Didn't make it very far." 

Luke couldn't seem to stop himself tonight, apparently. "Hey, I ain't complaining if it means you're closer by."

They inched over and pillowed their exhausted head on his chest, and Luke was sure he'd never been so warm and shivery. He reached up and stroked their hair, and they tightened their grip around his waist and mumbled something into his shirt that made his heart race even though he didn't know what it was. They felt different in his arms than they had all those years before; it was better. They fit closer, and they smelled wonderful, and before he knew it, he slept more deeply holding them in a truck bed than he had for months alone at home as the river crawled by next door. 

They woke up at sunrise. Luke realized that all he'd dreamed of was holding them in his arms exactly as they were. They looked a little less ragged, a little more settled, even sleep-mussed and sweaty, and a tiny smile quirked their lips as they drove him home.

"Will you be safe?" they asked. "I did kinda go all Joe Pesci on your brother."

" _Fuck_ him," Luke fired back. "Nothing to lose." 

"I still want to come in with you, if that's okay."  

A smirk toyed with the corner of Luke's mouth. He had almost a foot and a hundred pounds on them, they were a  _math professor_ for fuck's sake, but somehow he was still pretty sure they'd be a lot more intimidating if push came to shove. 

"Thank you. That's awful kind."

"Shouldn't I be thanking  _you?_ If you hadn't been in that car, I would've been fucked for sure." 

It turned out Randy was long gone by the time they pulled into the driveway. Luke didn't really care where he'd gone. They went home to get some sleep, and he fed the chickens and puttered around for a bit before catching a few more hours himself. He did have dinner to worry about, after all. 

"I'm thinking about selling," they confessed to him that night between mouthfuls of sweet corn and cheeseburgers, all of which had been grilled over the fire pit. They'd settled for eating on the front porch. 

The thought made Luke's stomach hurt, but he nodded. "It's a lot to deal with."

Their eyes dropped to the cracks in the floorboards. "I wish I could handle it better, but I don't even like being in that house by myself. At least he asked to be cremated, so I can put the funeral off a little longer. But I gotta get that shit together soon because finding a buyer could take forever." 

"Sounds like you're handling it better than I would," he offered. 

"I wish. Can't make up my damn mind. There's no real reason to keep any of it, but..." they trailed off, and shrugged. 

"Sentimental?" 

"I guess you could call it that. Part of me wants to keep it, or get something new built on the land. The commute wouldn't be terrible - I only teach a few days a week and most of my research gets done wherever I am. The city is alright, but being away made me realize I didn't hate this town nearly as much as I hated your brother." They winked at him, and Luke almost choked on his burger. 

"Well, I sure wouldn't mind it," he managed to stammer out. "You're practically family, at this point." 

They glanced up and he thought he saw a flash of a smile. "Really?"

"Oh yeah. The last step in the initiation process is whooping Randy's ass and you passed with flying colors." 

"Smartass." 

But they seemed brightened by the declaration, especially when it came with an invitation to crash. Luke rarely stayed in the house anymore, so he was glad to lend out one of the bedrooms, staying up too late in another. He tried to make sure they slept and ate without it being  _too_ obvious he was making sure they slept and ate. 

The funeral was an extremely low-key affair. Their dad had a flair for the sensible, and had apparently been quite insistent that all the usual fuckery be kept to a minimum. Everybody told stories, everybody brought food, everybody led traditionals in noisy, genuine circles. 

 _at my grave they'll still be singing_  
_though you weep for one that's gone_  
_sing it as we once did sing it:  
"it is better farther on"_  

They cried, and he hugged them tight to his chest, and stayed stuck to them like glue all afternoon.

The little church ladies kissed their cheeks, told them they were lucky to have such a good man behind them.

They turned pink, but didn't offer up any sort of correction.

They just said, "I am."  

But grief is thick, and contagious, and deeply acidic. It hurt to see the pain on their face as everyone began to trail out and he led them to his truck. It hurt to see them off to the guest room when all he wished for was to let them sleep in his arms. But, selfishly, he knew, what hurt the most was knowing they’d soon be leaving. 

Luke woke with a start sometime shortly before the witching hour to what he recognized as sobs coming from the bathroom. They'd collapsed on the cool tile, heaving from heartache, their meager stomach contents on display. Luke didn't say a word. He just checked their forehead, flushed the toilet, and let them lean on him while they brushed their teeth.

They didn't even try to go back to their own room, and even as he curled them up in a safe little package at his side, he thought this was a particular wish he could have done without. They thrashed and froze in their sleep and buried their face in the space between his beard and his hairline and their breath made him shiver.

Finally, after days of lawyers and notaries and cleaning out the house, they had to go back to the city. Life won't wait, as they say. Despite it all, that last night he spent draped over them in the big bed, listening to their heart slow and their breath go even. Every day had been better than the next, even if the inevitable conclusion threatened to eat Luke alive for reasons he couldn't even explain to his journal.

_Every time you're happy, I'm happy. Guts my heart to go without you but fills it back up to see you smile. I don't understand anymore. I want to carry you with me. I don't know what I'll do._

When they were gone, he got restless - pacing nights along the back forty, often sleeping on the floor of the two-room he'd built there to amuse himself when the farmhouse felt like an empty abyss. He washed the sheets on the guest bed but still immediately put them back. Just in case. 

Good days and bad. Mostly bad. 

"He was the only one left. Now I've got nothing." 

_You've got me. I know it ain't much, but you've got me and come hell or high water, I'm not leaving._

Luke underlined that last bit so many times, the ink bled through to the next page. 

They called every week or two, even if it was for five minutes, and finally, one day, he thought their voice sounded lighter.

Good days and bad. Maybe an even split. 

After one particularly long and feverish night, Luke decided he might have figured it out, or at least a start: he was going to build them something. That's what he did, after all; he built things and grew things and nourished them. He went to the library and started pulling up blueprints. He measured out the space and took down a few dead trees so they wouldn't fall. He even spent what felt like a billion hours at the county office making sure he had the right permits, truck bed filled with the good scrap lumber from old jobs.  

And he worked. Usually in the early morning, but sometimes when the nights were hard to come by. Sometimes Bray came over to help, whistling old songs that Luke couldn't quite place as he hammered. They enlisted Randy a few times, too, mostly as a pack mule, making sure he knew they were watching him like a hawk in case he fucked anything up. That pissed the youngest right the hell off, especially when they brought Erick in to breathe down his neck. Well, and help with the electrical, since he was actually qualified and therefore less likely to set them all on fire. 

"What am I, a fuckin' babysitter?" the big redhead grumbled, but he smiled while he said it and gave Randy an almost-affectionate shove with one huge hand that nearly toppled him over. 

"You're the wolf that guards the sheep, my dear friend," Bray proclaimed. 

Good days and bad. Maybe a few more were good. 

When the roof went up, Luke sent them a postcard that just said, “Come back for Christmas?” 

They sent him one back that just said, “Yes!" They'd doodled a little heart underneath.

* * *

He could cover both their eyes with one big hand. It wasn't necessary; he could feel they were firmly closed. Luke did it anyway, other hand on their far hip, because he could swear they were leaning into him as their boots crunched on the snow. Like the trembling of their eyelashes against his callused palm wasn't enough to do him in.

"Swear to Christ, Harper, if you run me into a damn tree, I will end you." But there was no malice in their voice, and they wrapped an arm around his waist to steady themselves during the trek. 

He nudged them to turn towards him and stooped to look in their face, laughing just a little when he realized what he was doing with their eyes still closed. 

"Before you say anything, we're well on my land now. I checked. If you want to sell your dad's place, or you just want to get away, you've got a front door to come to. Not that you have to, or all the time. But it's here." 

He uncovered their eyes, and when they blinked back at him, he pressed something into their hand.

They looked down, and blinked again. It was a key. He held their shoulders and turned them around. They saw, for the first time, the beautiful little cabin with the tiny porch and the bench outside, and their eyes got big. They kept trying to speak as he gently led them through the front door, and when he knelt to unlace their boots with fingers that were shaky from more than just cold, they leaned against the doorframe for support.

Their eyes got somehow even bigger as they both took off and hung up layers of coats and he kicked off his own boots.

"Oh my god, Luke. This is  _amazing._ " Their voice was thick with wonder as they took in the bright woodstove, the farm sink, the little two-seater couch. "You did all this yourself?"

He blushed and jammed his hands in his pockets. "Sure did. I built a littler one for myself a while back. Got tired of the big house when there's no company. Figured I could do you one better." 

"Is that... You built a loft!" They scrambled up the stepladder and almost smacked their head on the overhang. Luke flinched in preparation for the hit, stepped forward in case he needed to catch them, but they caught themselves and ducked just in the nick of time. 

They poked their head over the edge and he almost laughed at the cartoonish sight coupled with their joyful face.

"How... You fit two beds in here?" 

Luke smiled shyly at the unspoken question. "You can take one out if you want. Use the space. But I figured, if you ever want company that's closer'n a half-mile through the woods. Most of us don't fit on that couch."

They climbed down but not all the way, turning to face him and giggling that they could finally look him in the eye. They stumbled, and without thinking, Luke reached out to make sure they didn't fall. 

He grabbed on either side of the stepladder. They put one hand on his shoulder for balance, but then did something he didn't expect: they put their other hand gently on his chest, over his heart. Which was pounding. 

Luke tried to breathe and glanced around the inside of the cabin, not sure if they'd think he'd done the right thing. When he finally looked back in their big eyes, they smiled, and tucked a stray strand of hair behind his ear, and his heart started racing all over again.  

"I -" He tried to talk, but it was like flipping through every page of his notebook at the same time. 

_You came back I missed you you're so perfect like this I love you I love you I fucking love you -_

"I love you, too," they finished in a nervous exhale.

 _Too?_ They  _understand_ , he realized in a sudden shock of emotion. Everything he hadn't said, couldn't say.  _They understand_. 

They leaned forward, still tiptoeing on the steps, and gave him a kiss. It was lingering and soft and so, so warm. 

They didn't get off the ladder. They liked tall things. 

They liked  _him._

They  _loved_ him.

They loved him  _back._

Luke released the ladder and wrapped his arms around their waist. "Just want you happy," he murmured. "Just want you safe."

A moment and a small smile passed them by as they leaned their weight against his chest.  

"I am," they said. Then they kissed him again.  

This time, Luke had the presence of mind to kiss them back, press himself against them, haul them in as close as it got. They couldn't stop touching his face, running their hands all over him. Like they - 

"I don't ever want to leave," they mumbled. 

He couldn't help the smile that crept up his face. "Ain't nobody gonna make you." 

Luke kissed them one more time, still fumbling, still trying to map all this out, lost in the way that they tasted as sweet as he'd always imagined, before setting them cautiously on their feet on the floor. He went over to his toolbox and pulled out that hopelessly battered black and white notebook, crumpled pages practically exploding with his big scrawl.  

"What is that?" they asked, chewing on their lip.

"Started when you were in the hospital. Everything I wanted to say, but didn't. Didn't know how."  

"Like what?"

He set the notebook down on the kitchen table and swept them up into another kiss, a little less clumsy this time, a little more sure. "That I love you," he said simply, and despite everything that had just happened, they blushed adorably and ducked their head. "Got so caught up in how to say it. Didn’t realize it was gonna be that easy." He exhaled. "Love you. Always loved you, I think. Never wanted you to go, in any sense. Never wanted to lose you."

"Love you," they mostly-whispered, as though still testing out how the words felt in their mouth. "Loved you before I knew what that was."

Luke bent down and kissed them both breathless. When he pulled back at long, reluctant last, he tilted his head in thought, and looked at the composition book.

They gave him the eyebrow, and in return he chuckled before asking, "You want to read it?" 

They rolled the thought around in their mind for a while, concluding, "Don't think I need to." 

"Good, because I ain't ever doing that again."

Their laughter bubbled up and made him smile. "Sending it straight to the source from here on out?"

"You bet. Everything I got.” Luke thumped a big fist over his heart for emphasis. “Starting right now." He picked the notebook up and crossed to the warmest part of the room. 

They followed, wrapped their arms around his waist from behind, pressing their face against his shoulderblades. 

Luke opened the woodstove door and pitched the notebook in. 

Everything he needed was already here. 

 

 

 _hark! i hear hope sweetly singing_  
_softly in an undertone,_  
_singing as if god had taught her:_  
_"it is better farther on"_

 _farther on, still go farther_  
_count the milestones one by one_  
_my love will forsake you never_  
_it is better farther on_

 

**Author's Note:**

> *The history of "Better Farther On" is, if you are a nerd like me, a fascinating one. It's generally thought of as a hillbilly gospel number typically attributed to the Carter Family, and that's usually how I explain it to people, but music historians have traced recognizable versions of the song [back as far as the 1870s,](https://hymnary.org/text/oft_i_hear_hope_sweetly_singing_softly_i) and maybe even earlier. The earliest version of the "modern" lyrics I have found so far is from [a 1909 revival songbook. ](http://www.his.com/~sabol/Better-Farther-On-from-Glorious-Light.jpg)
> 
> The first time I ever heard it, and many times since then, I heard it sung with relatively secular lyrics (ex. "my love will forsake you never"), and I myself perform it that way, so i've used a blend of secular/non-secular/historic lyrics. However, as with many oral traditions, there are a number of variations; most, if not all, recorded versions use non-secular lyrics ("Jesus will forsake you never"). i have also chosen a non-secular, multi-part ballad version to link simply because it's the one i like to listen to the most, but I've also heard it sung many times in unison or with accompaniment. It goes a lot of ways. They're all pretty good.


End file.
